It's never quite bright enough
by sass angel
Summary: Post Chosen. Five years after the fall. Time always comes full circle in the end. As told from first Buffy and then Spike.
1. Buffy's story

**Disclaimers and such: Not mine. Never will be. Nuff said.**

**Feedback goes to me at sass_angel@yahoo.com**

**I wrote this because I needed to. Because we all need a little extra and I hope I delivered. **

**Dedicated as always to Trisha my beta and my friend. For Spike. For Buffy. For Giles. For all of them. And for the women I've met and loved throughout this fandom. **

**It's never quite bright enough.**

**The thought strikes at inopportune moments as it always does. Right now, on another plane crossing the ****Atlantic****, hopefully for the last time, she thinks about the light.**

**Dawn is curled in the next seat, laptop at the ready, though Buffy wonders how she still manages to fold those way-too-longlegs up in such a small pace. But Dawn manages. There are bits of her sister that never grew up; this is one indication. She holds on tightly to the tiny pieces of her innocence, even as she proclaims herself grown and an independent woman. In the five years since Sunnydale sank into the ground, Dawn has never left her side. There was a time when she had pushed and pulled at her sister, to go to college, make a life away from the endless wanderlust that gripped Buffy. Then, in a moment that showed the true level of maturity Dawn had reached, she calmly explained that normal was not an option for herself any more than it was for Buffy...so shut up and deal.**

**A slight grin pulled up the edges of Buffy's mouth as she watched Dawn chew on a bit of hair while entering another endless series of key strokes, working on the latest batch of research. If things had been different she could have been a Watcher. She had the skills, which just grew with each passing year. A Watcher equivalent with honors. Aided and, Buffy sometimes thought, abetted by a certain retired librarian.  It was not the life she would have chose for Dawn but it was the life Dawn chose for herself and after all is said and done, it's all about choices. __**

**A hand sneaks between the seats, grabbing at the forgotten bag of peanuts laying between Dawn and herself. Buffy raises a brow and grins over the seat as her other companion tears into his stolen prize, a less than repentant grin on his face. Dawn hadn't been the only one who had followed her from one end of the world to the other...one battle to the next.  Xander left the group for a while, went to find himself apparently. He never told her what he had found, just showed up one day, tired and a bit too much with the world weary look. She stills thinks he found Anya, or his peace with heranyway. Since then he'd had a few women come and go in the night, but he never quite let them have that part of himself he left in Sunnydale. She knows how that feels. __**

**A lot can change in five years; a lot can't. Love, the kind that sticks with youthrough the beginning to the end and beyond may grow but it never really changes. The warmth and security in a Giles hug is a constant. Even in that last year in Sunnydale when things were...less than great between them, the love was always there. It was there in his kitchen this morning as he saw them off to the airport, with a quick squeeze and a peck on the forehead. Well, maybe that had changed. He was much more with the home_-_baseness now and much freer with the affection. She wished he'd found someone to share his life with but again, the choice was not hers to make. Besides, it took a certain type of female to be comfortable with a wide array of young women tromping through the house at all times, messing with the doilies. Or so he told her when she pressed the issue. Maybe someday. As it stood, Giles always had a room and a cup of tea for a wayward Slayer and her entourage, all the Slayers and damn there are a lot of them. But there is one room that is left free at all times that belongs to the original and there's a certain amount of comfort in knowing that wherever she is, whatever she is doing, that room exists. Over the years Giles has come to represent home for her, more so now than ever before when home was a commodity that seemed like a very far away dream when she was stuck in a cave in Zimbabwe waiting out a demon that had gotten a taste for the townspeople instead of goats. So, after every excursion, she finds herself making her way to ****England**** and him...sometimes a girl never outgrows her daddy.**

**Speaking of potentials...or Slayers now. The ones that survived the last battle on the hellmouth took off shortly after, like rats scattering in the light. Okay, maybe not such a nice analogy, but that was pretty much the way it went. Sometimes an event like that would bring the survivors closer together, but she'd pretty much figured they wanted to get the hell away from her. Not that she really blamed them.Leading them had been a bitch, she hopes they figured that out afterward.Well, except for Kennedy. That girl was utterly clueless. She honestly has no idea how ****Willow**** puts up with her. Theirrelationship is a constant struggle to decide who was on top...okay, another bad analogy. Not that she saw them a lot, they stayed pretty much in the States,but when she did there was no doubt that love was the driving force behind it all. That was most likely the truth behind why she disliked Kennedy_. _Out of all of them, **Willow****** was the only one who got to take her love beyond the mess. That had also been a good part of the reason they separated shortly after the dust settled. Not that any of them begrudged ****Willow**** her hard_-_won relationship. But sometimes you really feel the loss of another while in the company of those that hadn't. So, there was some petty jealousy in the mix.When push came to shove they were, after all, human. Besides, they made ****Willow**** keep Andrew. __**

**So that was all of them. Could be summed up in a few short paragraphs on a blank notebook in some Watcher's journal if they had Watchers anymore. Of course there was way more to all their stories, there always is, but the end result is the same. They survived and continue to do so. **

**But still...there is never enough light. __**

**No matter how many candles are lit, how many lamps bought, how many drapes thrown open to let in the daylight...even the sun itself, there is never enough light.**

**And she blames Spike for that. __**

**Which is funny when you think about it. He spent his existence in the shadows and his testament to soul and life resides in the illumination he gave at the end. Wherever she goes, whatever she does, her reminder, her tribute, her penance to the man who, at the end, she loved. **

**There are a few words. Man and love. She never thought those would be weighing down anywhere in the realm with Spike. But they are, they did and it was good. He was good. __**

**A slim shiver of light peeks through the airplane window and she closes her eyes. She letsthe brief light of the sun warm her face. In the years that have passed, she's learned a lot and forgotten a bit and most of all discovered that forgiveness and choice are the most important of them all.  As it stands, she's lit the last of her candles and proclaimed herself done. The last flight she plans to be on for awhile should hit LA in a few hours, ****Willow**** and Kennedy will be waiting to drive her to the next stage of her life. **

**There's someone there who has also finished baking.**

**Onto Spike's story **

****


	2. Spike's story

**Spike's journey **

**It's never quite bright enough.**

**Once you've been up close and personal with the true power of light everything else just kinda pales in comparison.**

**Or it's her fault. More likely to go with the second choice. **

**But that's on the days when humanity is too bloody hard and the headaches are threatening to bust open his skull. Cause you know they never tell you about all those little clauses and piss_-_offs when they make you human. Not that he had a choice in the matter anyway. Still doesn't remember how it even happened. He'd been the champion of the piece, a bloody stack of virtue on the altar of her life,blaze of glory and all that shit...more like, take one for the team. Never asked to be reborn, never asked for headaches and stomach cramps and pissing himself in the middle of the night because he forgot to go the bathroom again. But he got it, in spades. The only thing that drug him through those first days after was sticking it to Angel cause don't think there wasn't enough of the former big bad left in him to let a little thing like snatching the 'champion of the people's' reward out from under his nose go unnoticed. Repeatedly. __**

**His fingers tighten on the steering wheel as the sun beats down on his face and obscures his vision. Fred always bugs him to wear sunglasses. She doesn't get it.  Which is surprisingbecause of the lot of them, she's the one who understands the most. Probably comes from being the only estrogen_-_based life form in a sea of overdone testosterone. Not that she doesn't love it. Little Miss ****Texas****, loves to get the boy's motors running in her direction. She'd never admit as much but it's damn entertaining to watch...expect when she turns her big eyes his way. That's not so much fun and after the last time, he hopes she's learned. He's only a man, and human now at that, but in the end...no one is Buffy. So they're friends. He has a few of those now. Amazing what a pulse lends to your social life. **

**The revolving door of fighting and fucking at the grand offices of Wolfram and Hart are ever constant though the core remains the same. Funny how the grand and noble plan is more often than not overshadowedby the relationships that lie within. Take Wes and Lilah for instance. Now if they weren't a living metaphor for him and the Slayer he didn't know what was. Nothing stops a fatal attraction like that, not even death, and he would know. They fight and they shag and they threaten to kill each other on an almost daily basis but neither will admit that what keeps them together is love. He'd tried to talk some sense into Wes; women were way too confusing to reason with at the best of times. Mind, given that his alcohol tolerance isn't quite what it used to be, that bender with Wes was probably not the best way to go about it. Or the stripper for that matter. Someday they might figure it all out but he personally thinks they just like to hate each other. Makes the shagging that much hotter. Besides, the girl finally admits she loves you and the town sinks into the ground. Probably better to leave well enough alone. __**

**So he's a bit bitter, just a touch, not even close to the level of acidic broodiness the 'great and exalted, formerly gonna be Shanshued until the better man got there first', gets up to. Honestly, he's been more than tempted to call up ****Willow****, send Angel off with that Gwen girl for a few hours, pop the soul in and out and let them all have a little peace. But he won't. For all Angel's faults-and the list is alphabetically organized in a drawer by his bed-Spike wouldn't have survived without him. They bitch and tear at each other like a couple of old hens but family is what matters in the end and Angel gave him that. So he stood by when Cordy finally woke up and promptly moved on, he was there when Connor came back and left shortly after. He was the one who, at three in the morning, was refilling the shot glasses because after a hundred plus years on this earth, only someone who's been there can really understand the humanity of loss. __**

**Gunn sure as hell doesn't get it. He's a good buddy, hell on wheels in a fight but what the hell can you really discuss with a guy who thinks he knows it all and will never come close. Lorne, maybe, but there's a bit too much puffiness there to really let your guard down.**

**So they all assimilate, they change and they stay the same.**** He's learned more about human nature in five years as a human than an eternity of studying it. Walk a mile in the shoes, he's guessing. A few more wrinkles, a lot more scarring and the ability to lead a life that doesn't revolve around the needs of others unless he chooses. You'd think he would have figured that out earlier. He'd like to say he's a different man since they stuck him with a heart beat. But he's really not. The bleach is gone, so is the coat. Somewhere in the city, a bank account has his name on it, dutifully stocked up with a bi-weekly salary but at the core, same snark, same passion...same ability to go from sweet to asshole in under sixty seconds. But he's foundsomething that he never had before. Pride in himself. Which is whyhe's here now. Why he can be. There has been no contact, not even a phone call.  They both knew where the other was, snippets of info passed around the office. It wasn't time...until it was. **

**He parks the car and lingers those last few moments in the light before throwing open the airport doors. Reminded again that it's never quite bright enough, but it will be soon. A flash of blonde, catches the corner of his eye as the passengers spill out of the arrival area. **

**Here comes the light. **

**Notes from Sass: I just like to think they can figure it out now on their own from here. **


End file.
